The Armor of The Saint (Final Chapter)

There will be more caves to travel through. But with this last entree I am ending "To Fight The Sun"

For the most part, this past year has been unchronicled. Partly due to the fact that the past season has been full of my sharpening. My red sword has reached a strength, every swing has purpose, every joust is well placed. I have been training with my father.
 Salvation comes with trembling.
There is a weight to the violations and the transgressions both against me and by me. My pleas for prayer have been met with angels at my side. Together the heavenly host and I have sorted out the reasons for stoning, the milestones included. I've got a nice little pile stacked up for me, but it's dust in the wind by the breath of my Lord.
His breath is continuous. His breath manifests a pillar before me.

I can't reinvent my religion, it's as singular as the resurrection and only as practical as our reconciliation. The consistency of the King keeps me glad to be alive in the face of anxiety and circumstantial uncertainty. Continuous calamity can only be met by unrivaled joy of the Father. By the cross all things are possible.
If we truly are risen with him
if he calls us Saints
if the Father really does see Christ when he see's us
if he declares Christ to be who we are
If that, then thus;
Our identity is secure. Sin has no hold on us, Sin has no authority over us, Sin is not even of us. Do saints sin? We must separate our Identity from our carnal natures. Surely we still sin, but sin is not from our establishment as sons of God; and that is surely our true nature, our true self. I have cast off the term sinner. I am a Saint.
With this revelation, I have finally seen my shield. My faith has come to a culmination in this, I am a Son of God. The shield of faith may not be large, but within the mysterious wood there is a double portion of deep magic to keep me safe. I am protected.
My faith was not missing throughout my life, Christ- the Author of my Faith- was protecting my back as journeyed through the dark.

As my red sword shines in full brilliance, the word of God (which is spirit) illuminates the fullness of these caves. The enemy does not approach unseen. Within the bride I am fully equipped to defend myself against the enemy. Not only thus, but with authority, to speak life and vitality into God's faithful elect.

The phrase, To Fight The Sun, was purposed to refer to the futileness of resisting God. The sun is life-giving, and beyond the scope of the power of a man. In the same way, God desires to only pour our life from himself, and he makes men like blades of grass. Greater knowledge of him brings a conviction to greater faith and trust. I was born naked, now I am clothed by the armor of God. In full awareness I am equipped.

I am restored. I am reconciled. I am resolved.

I am new.

Onto Aslan's Land.

Teach me some melodious sonnet.

There is a room where I have collected myself on curious mornings. I have been flooded with thoughts that are deprecating to the soul, that do not stem from logical discourse, but from fear when I am amongst the unknown. And I have discerned that there are demons, who rage against my family; where I have thought there was enough suffering, more brokenness ensues. Evil arises and rears its ugly head, challenging everything I believe in.

I do not understand.
Panic is a powerful thing; it aims to reveal the hopelessness of every situation. In a sense, panic is as natural as depravity is. Often we turn a blind eye to suffering to keep a steady temperament. But I feel morally obligated to pursue truth at the expense of my own emotional stability. The irony is, as I pursue naturalistic truth, my own depravity gets the better of me, and corrupts my mission. So instead I pursue logical vindication for the convictions of my pride and shame. And my mind becomes a wasteland once again.

There is a balance though. A resurgence even. With every lie whispered, a prayer is spoken. With every temptation, a foreign dialect makes a perfect plea.
I am surrounded by men encircled with golden light. Cowboys covered in grace, elected for armored battles. Upon my confession, resurrection is on their lips. This is the culture of Buruchaperu- shelter and sanctuary to the broken and humbled.
Within Buruchaperu there is a room. I meet with the Brother-King and I tell Him all my secrets. Upon His request, and solely that, I bear to Him all my afflictions. We shake together in the wave of the ether. I am lost without this time. I am at drift at sea, I am bound by the weight of my iniquities, I am a prideful coward in my ministry if it is not for this time. I pity the lost moments, for my life is a gift.
My greatest fear is that an agenda against my King has risen from my influence. From my apathy. In my panic I call for my last rites. I do not want my King to bear the weight of my iniquities. But when I make the claim to my own suffering and wrath that is due my King cries to me "GET BEHIND ME, SATAN!"

He is fierce for my heart. He has jealousy demanding as the grave. And I am not sure of the amount of honor I bestow upon Him. There is a great voice that says it is "Nothing". There is something in my heart that agrees with the accuser. But He would wrestle with me, and pin me and bless my head. You my Holy Brother, would bless me without my approval. In the blessing I am aware of the False King. The words of the Juggernaut were always coming from the Throne Room. But upon entering, I see he is restrained by the Beatific Secrets, and his authority was a hoax. My definition lies with the Word of the Kadosh Triumvirate.

I weep at the reality of an Identity in a blessing that was given to me. It is enough for me. I don't need to be Einstein or Edison. Upon seeing the face of Grace, knowledge just gave me reason to rejoice in an indiscernible syllogism. It was holier if I did not know. It was more imitate as I fell forward into trust. I only hold a finite vision in my eyes, would it not hold to stand that if I cast my cares upon the Person of the Steadfast Truth, that my vision would cease to be necessary. So it seems my search for understanding is finished. Jesus Christ is the truth. His Grace is enough. That is the object of my pursuit.

The Father is proud of me. The Father blessed me.
In the hidden rooms of Buruchaperu, My torch became a Red Sword, which was engulfed in a flame that did not burn. It rests at my right hand, for I rest now in the temple of my Father.

Short breaths and slow prayers

There are distances and calculations on my mind. A revolving mass of intangible obstacles orbits my head, till exhaustion brings me to that dreaming space. My thoughts are a wasteland of fiction.
As I sort through what's fantasy and memory, I wonder if those years are reconcilable to me.

Brother-King, what impossible feats do you have at your command to terraform such a planet into the kingdom of heaven? I'm thinking through an incomplete melody, the sound is still sweet, but the lyrics are lost on me. I'm listening for the words in between, but I feel incapable of any capacity of trust. I'm dying for the mystery inside the miracle, and I'm appalled that there's something in me that thinks its identification is elsewhere. This shouldn't hurt, should it? The stress in my back persists as I run home, I have short breaths and slow prayers. The anxiety seems chronic to our sub-species and also hereditary and to be transferred by bloodstream. I've thus contracted doubts and ghosts and lies. How can something so empty seem so romantic to me?

The Desert Emissary has been digging with me for months, and we've been pretty sure these caverns go deeper. He's been pushing me to build a temple, and I've been speaking of taking up sword and spear. My patience fled when the scramble started again, and I've felt pretty raw ever since. Still reverberating spurned memories, I can't believe that nostalgia is getting to me. Every illogical sentiment springs rage where romance once grew, I can't trust the possibilities.
My brother Emissary listened diligently as I tried to find the end of me. No magic could conceive the desire my blues seems to need. I'm not a travelling man at heart, I'll come back home to hide away in a couple of rooms. Sometimes I have to leave though, when I'm being beckoned by this hollow sober sickness. I know glittering spectres can't lead me across burnt bridges. I know self examination can't produce all the answers to the unsettled questions I carry. I guess I can't see everything.

I want to see everything

I wish to be the effective wordsmith that with each syllable manipulates fates and illuminates weighty truth. Rather, I'm more of a miner digging through hard stone, stuck on a hunch that the gold is just on the other side of the bedrock. If my soul is a cavern, I'm the one trying to burrow deeper into secret subterfuge. Any futile labor biased falsehood leaves wonder betrayed. I've left my wonder betrayed.
If the evidence that darkness has no substance is written on my hands then why are eyes so desperate to see it? I can't wrap my mind around it. I can't wrap my mind around it all.

And I'm wondering if wandering blind is the intention, if my life started out an exodus
Forty years in the desert till I stepped up for my fathers. Time burns before my bed, and my mouth waters while I watch. By the power of fantasy, our hearts are unaligned to reality, by the power of fantasy, our eyes turn from truth.

On many attempts I've sought out a change in intellectual process, but the fruit of knowledge has grown bitter in my mouth too many times. I've been stubbornly building a tower of babel and I've been making a lot of loveless noise. Should I shut my mouth, I hear the voice of God. In all my searching, I've been speaking through the subjects, but grief comes quickly to rambling men.
Thankfully,
The Entity of Weight comes to threshing floor to wrestle the punksaints and eternal cowboys. The mystery of his breath brings reasoning men to bow in worship. His words are sharper than any sword on my belt, and his eyes burn like lamps, bright with understanding and clarity. Humility comes over the room like a shockwave, we know our Messiah has returned.

 Quiet and patient, I wait on the Master.

Like a child, I am received by the king. Like a blind man, Jesus gives me sight. I can't see everything, but the love of my life is within constant vision. I can lay down the mantle of scientist and pick up the yolk of this relationship. And my Brother-king, he is making a way for me, he is making a place for me to call my own. When mischief of this world burns away, I can come to him and receive my home. Sweet vision, lay my mind to rest, I make my home in your sacred heart.

Nourishment

Cultural inclinations and categories hold their meaning in daily communications, actions and perceptions. My ability to be different from all the other regular attendees is completely uninspired and if I ever hope to grow to become something greater than whats under the sun, I have to meet the expectation for depth that I have committed myself to.

Why pursue such a vigorous course? Because I have all my cards in the truth. I am dedicated to alleviate the falsehood in my mind. I've been licenced to carry this sword on good faith, and I have been coordinated into glory and interwoven into wonder. But I cannot recieve hope on an empty promise, nor can I receive the blessings of a false deity. I tell you the truth, I've struggled my whole life with false deities. I'll count sleepless nights, clocking in to a network of shame and fallacies. Behind my eyes lies distorted chemistries of addiction and narcism. Thought that I looked like a more honest man, but I always had a sneaking suspicion that I was a thief at heart. I'll trade that heart in, but I'm hesitant to receive unwarranted gifts from a mysterious warrior. But when the sun comes out, I always see that he is a King cloaked in purity, flowing from his heart and lips. He's got a gnash in his side ten inches wide and there are holes in the same hands that fed me bread when I was a kid.

 I'll tell the king, I remember very well the times when I was fasting and I didn't mean to be fasting, but I went without. I would reflect on those who daily went without, they were on the television right after the commercials for my favourite fast food joint. Being a greedy child growing up under the Nazarene I had mixed feelings about nutrition. I spent my time speaking to the romantics; I liked the story they whistled up during their hopeless nights. The consequences of amusement park love songs seemed to rest as far away as I wished them to be. When I grew up I witnessed how many go lucky killers had nostalgia as their epitaph and the kids on the block had rumors about my tombstone going up as soon as I hit rock bottom. I was pretty sure that was what the Juggernaut had planned for me. Had I forgot the one who was broken so I could be remade I don't know if I would have gotten my nutrition straight. If I ate what they fed me, it didn't matter how much I received because tommorow I'd be twice as hungry as yesterday, with a headache to top it off.

Juggernaut made so many promises, and I believed everyone. His soul was as hollow as mine, but I grew up under the Nazarene. Instead of  leaving me to despair, at a young age, I knew a king who died to fill this empty carcass with an everlasting spirit. Serenity, selfless affections, an exuberance of life; these were laid into my hands as gifts of grace. And as I ate of them warmth returned to my body. The wellspring cup of saving blood overflew and ran down my beard onto my chest as I drank. As I returned from my impoverished place into the tabernacle of holiness that he declared my home. Communion fed my soul and brought me home.

Look and see, a Grand Commision followed by resolutions based in eternal convictions fertilizes a heart to grow deep roots of hope. Earthquakes come and apostates are confronted and weakness undermines all my self righteous claims. But the hope remains, and the gospel remains. Brother-King is walking with me uphill as I dwell on destruction, bent in stubbornness on vindication and pride. With each step I'm belittling a creator and spitting curses and spurning righteousness, all the same he claiming me as his own. God's wrath is satisfied in the substitution of blood and the ordinance or restitution is completed in my communion with an intimate deity.

 I cannot turn from the sun for its radiance surrounds me; and Christ, in all his providence, remains present in my insecure immersions in idolatry. I'll take up sword and cross; Grace in all his majesty compels me by beauty; securing for me daily, riches in dreams and aspirations for compassion and reconciliation, that are beyond me.

The milestone hosannah

Take away this median, I will not just be the medium, but the source. On short notice I would like to concieve into you a different spirit. I'd to renew you with my enlightened insight, and captivate you with my self-produced piety and power.



No, I do not see into the everlasting nor do I understand the inner workings of eternity. I am not the infinitely righteous incarnate, but I am often defining myself by the thoughts of existential corpses. I will stand on these vanity based prophecies; I might curse your soul, but I will glorify my pride. It's not necessarily that I have a warhead planted at your head, but the shrapnel is coming your way all the same. Deception captivated my fathers generation like it has captivated mine. And in time, if I am not constantly aware of my speech I will leave a trail of humans caught in the confusion of my hypocrisy.

Woe to the one who speaks much.

Christ, you said your burden was light, but my burden seems to be a milestone. How can this be the plan? That you would have a carnal creep like me, to keep care to the King's most precious sheep? In retrospect to the relationships you blessed me with, I understand my depravity. With the depth of resolve came the struggle to vindication. In vindication and a search for comfort, I became the anesthesia for truth, and the sound of my voice caused men to cringe.

 Do the prayers dissipate the pollution, if the poison was my own solution? By my own hands, I cannot bring comfort to your weary shoulders, I can alleviate momentary pain, but suffering returns of it's own accord. By my own hands, I cannot muster anything lasting. Should you like to stay by my side, I will leave, and I will fade away in time.

I appeal to the mercy promised in abundance, destined to overthrow the earthly authority. I knows the ruins and wreckage among the temples will bust within the fire when the everlasting meets the definite. Thence comes forth the radiance of the Glory of God, and the cold nights will be no more. Sore eyes will find their renewal and nicotine tarnished tapestries will be washed with the blood of the lamb to be as bright as the sons of thunder.

Hosannah

Jesus Christ. A human ruler and a holy king, the suffering servant. I need my life in your hands. Drinking from your wellspring of life, the Spirit of peace and intimacy, I receive the proper words, not to vindicate myself, but to exalt the sacred heart of my beloved Lord. I rest always in my confirmation by this war language, knowing that I am ever-tethered to the sustaining Grace of my Savior.

Glorious light, the way is bright for those whom you call blessed.

Good Jesus, the treasure that you have bestowed at this wretches feet. Ten thousand upon ten thousand upon ten thousand blessings. The melody of your compassion breaks men at their ankles; raptured by symphonies of restitution, and by rhythms of resurgence we are compelled to weep at the feet of the bloody lamb, Son of God and Son of Mary.

As I breathe in the fragrance you were anointed with, I am reminded you were blessed by a prostitute, and you word is spoken through the words of a murderer. Your heart is the ignition and composition of compassion, and by your hand skeletons find skin and flesh. By your hand I find enough hope to sit and be silent and know that you are God.

Blessed be your name.

One thousand blessings and One thousand Curses

Perturbed.

Well, I'm either riddled with anxiety or I'm coercing myself into a drone state of apathy to alleviate the discomfort of feeling like a deadweight. I wonder if there is a difference between being sober and wild with apprehension and expectation, every turning corner a sensation. Still the same in the end. One thousand blessings and one thousand curses. I curtail the list of grievances and exalt with incense and mihr the good and sweet sounds. I apply the echoes of wonder to my daily doctrines and to my planned outlines of the destiny of all. Isn't that the requisite for love based hope, a fucking happy ending?

Still we are burning in our passions and our lusts and we are on fire with tension in our gritty bits as we try to give a fuck about each other. Dear God, I don't want to place aside that struggle for honest meaning for a little time groping your shame centered features.

We exchange stories collected from our hysteria. We are not still as we sigh and wish and wish and wish we could collect those elicit feelings captured in our perfect polaroids. I'd like to place my hand on yours to calm your quivering spirit. I'd like to place my hands on your shoulders and bring back a relaxed state to your heart. I'd like to introduce you to my freaky and fiery friends, whom all have nuances I find extremely charming. I'd like to see my mother console you through your difficult mind, past all the obstacles constructed, by you or my adversary.

I'd like to see a hundred friends gathered round a birthday cake, as every one of them sing to you to the best of their ability a song you probably hate. I'd like to see tears in your eyes, as you realize everyone of these people love you and would give anything for you. If I told you this, you would have a million objections, I know. But I wonder if the thousand blessings I'll pray for you tonight would outweigh the nine hundred ninety nine curses you place upon yourself.

My rotten soul would curse you one time out of spite. Out of its satanic nature. And I'll wonder if I'm the spitting image of my father. Adolescence counted by the clock of sexuality. You might ask if this is really true, if my issues are really this carnal. I'd admit that I'm a blasphemer like the rest.

I just hope, that with the one thousand blessings we got, that maybe my Brother-King can work out something.

For your soul and mine.

Lets, make a promise you and I. Lets value honesty and humility for the rest of our days. I'm convinced I'm wrong on so many accounts, and I keep losing track of those who keep me accountable. Summers surrendering back to the confines of my second guessing spirit can't keep me a child forever. I have to make these blessings work and I need to place confidence on something other than myself.

I have to try to figure the outlaying and arithmetic of my words and boundaries before I go doctoring blessings under laden with self-righteous curses. Every relational entity is fragmented by broken hearts, and I am weary from this asunder fabric we call a church. But it's a melody I can't criticize, as it carries the crucifix for my benefit.

Ten thousand upon ten thousand blessings poured out unto me. Call up the resistance and tell them their tears are for naught, I have a home in heaven. Come along. Cast down your burdens and spit your worst curse my way. Could we stumble into heaven? I'm sure my Brother-King could work something out.

Culture War

No, I cannot put down a hand of blessing upon injustice. Twisted words and neglected context brings a man into disparity. The flustered words of the mother hen won't break down the sin sewn to the backs of these cowardly men. Same way I cannot pull my brothers from the lions den. We could take cynical steps towards undermining their upbringing but you can't wage a culture war and succeed in saving their songs.All my friends would rather raise their glasses then sink to sharp swinging words. Those demons will drag us ten feet deep. Power holds no meaning in regards to the souls uplifting.

No, I don't know where to go with the layman. I would rather spin him up a story to satisfy his rumbling spirit, but he wouldn't wrestle the truth down like I would like him to. He'd fight it for a minute, but then lay for a drink, in the customs he's accustomed to, despite the growing severity.

You ask me, whats so severe. And I'm sure the flustered hen could tell you. She might say the plot is out of order and theres a darker deviousness that would ensue. Just mischief you might say, were not bound by the law. Yet consequences are heartbreaking and mediocrity gets raised as a higher and higher standard of living.  We exalt empty promises, and witty comebacks. That's our victory, that's our solution. But demise is awaiting your last heartbeat. And I wouldn't have it. The thought wrecks me.

I could find words. I could find answers, but It troubles me to systematically meditate upon regiment and structure. I've seen enough hollow homes cascading around as successful stereotypes, playing the worlds game, trying on the emperors new clothes. I understand the flood in this context. God in the highest is here to appease loneliness. But his work seems to overflow with abundant victory despite whatever reason I use to conduct orderly diagnostics.

God, I am convicted of using a scarecrow. I am frightened by falsehood, yet I am addicted to hypocrisy.
The scale of destruction frightens me. I have fantasies about annihilating my enemies, about ripping them limb from limb so that terrorism might seek shelter and not find a place to hide. I am not the Christ. Neither is the Church. But we are missionaries of the ministry of reconciliation. We exist as salt and light and his joy, even if the truth of this is found to be absurdity.

The greater absurdity is this culture war. Neither evangelism nor reconciliation. Before a war against secularism, can we have wrestling within the Church for unity?

For what is a marriage but intimate?